Man stabbed eight times in Hulhumalé

A 22-year-old man stabbed Saturday night in the capital’s suburb Hulhumalé is in a stable condition at the Indira Gandhi Memorial Hospital in Malé.

According to IGMH’s Spokesman Ahmed Mausoom, the victim is undergoing treatment for eight stab wounds in his head. He was brought to Malé in the early hours of Sunday and his condition has since stabilised.

The victim was stabbed on the third stairwell of flat number one and the assault was reported to the police around 12:35 am.

“By the time the police went to the scene the man was being treated at the Hulhumalé hospital,” the police spokesman said.

The victim was later transferred to the main tertiary hospital in Malé for tests and further treatment.

No arrests have been made so far and the case is under investigation.

According to online paper VFP, the victim lives in Hulhumalé and was assaulted by a group who went from Malé.

Some 769 cases of assault have been reported to the police so far this year, down from 932 in 2015.

Last month, an 18-year-old man was stabbed in Malé amid a spike in violent assaults in the capital. He recovered after undergoing surgery for severe head injuries.

The police at the time arrested 20 suspects and impounded three motorbikes. The 20 young men included suspects in recent assaults as well as repeat offenders taken into custody to prevent further violence, the police said.

The assaults came after a period of calm in Malé after a spike in gang violence last June saw two 14-year-old boys killed in a fight between rival groups. They were the youngest victims of gang violence in the Maldives.

After the fatal stabbings, former Home Minister Umar Naseer blamed juvenile delinquency on “blind love” from parents and announced plans to send off minors involved in gangs to a police training facility on the island of Vaanee in Dhaalu Atoll.

Some 19 teenagers were sent to a two-month training camp on the island that concluded in August.

In the wake of the violence in June, suspected gang members were also monitored through electronic tags, a measure introduced in the new anti-terrorism law.